Tarin's folly
Tarin was the type of man to strike when the enemy had his guard down, and it had made him rich and powerful. A favorite quote of his "A sleeping man guards no gold" became his mantra.He and his men started out small, raiding sleeping traders on the roads, and soon he would strike at caravans. The men would be killed, and the women taken for pleasure. But Tarin was a clever man, he would take the wagons, the Onfan and the horses, and he would set his own men to drive them. Soon, all caravans in two hundred miles answered to Tarin, and trade is the blood of civilizations. Anyone who stood in his way would soon be found dead or missing. In a mere five years, Tarin placed a crown on his head and claimed fifteen noblewomen as his wives. The lands around sought war, and Tarin responded in kind. And thus it came to, that in his twelfth year in reign, craven for power and pressured by a half dozen wars and rebellions, Tarin sought to strike when his enemies were defenseless. During the Month of Rholim, he planned, and when Selanim came he foraged out, raiding cities and burning fields. Before the first day was over, Tarin's hair paled and fell out.
By the second, his teeth blackened and bled.
On the third, all his nails fell off, and his first child fell off a horse and was crushed under a merchants cart.
On the fourth day, his youngest son was born, a blackened monster, scaled and horned.
On the fifth day, all the food in his halls turned to rot.
On the sixth day, Tarin called back all his men, even as a stench of rot oozed from him.
On the seventh day, all his men were found, rooted to the ground where they marched, turned into trees, blood weeping from their eyes, mouths fixed in silent screams of anguish and regret.
On the eight day, all his children and all his wives climbed the highest tower and flung themselves into the moat, where poisonous plants immediately grew rampant and started tearing at the walls.
On the ninth day, Tarin, rotting and in terrible agony drew his blade and made to fall on it. Before the blade could pierce his heart, he transformed, his limbs became as wood, and a wicked-looking and sickly gnarled tree, with leaves of dark red, grew from his hunched back. The limbs of the tree forever cradling a brilliant blade, ever desperate to finish the act, but no longer able to. Tortured and weeping in his agony to this very day, the tree is known as Tarins folly still stands, never growing, never dying but always craving for the death he was denied. In a ruined castle, in an abandoned town, the anguished moans of the harvest reaper echoing through the empty streets.
And the last son, watching over his father, so no man can release him from his torture. Thus Selanti enacted her revenge, for the harvest is sacred, and every action holds a just reward.
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